Migrating from IRC OFTC to Tor friendly IRC network

[phabricator-migrator]

Information

ID: 361
PHID: PHID-TASK-s2nkp423ancjgm7wat2k
Author: HulaHoop
Status at Migration Time: open
Priority at Migration Time: Normal

Description

OFTC while welcoming Tor users is mostly unavailable because of blocks against abuse. Our official support channel has become mostly useless.

I propose choosing a different network from this page and moving to it:

BlockingIrc · Wiki · Legacy / Trac · GitLab

(Networking that try to provide normal access to Tor and remove K-lines)

Some networks have an Onion Service dedicated to Tor users.
Anonymous access should be possible and not pseudo-anonymity measures like SASL.

Should coordinate with Qubes.
migrate "unofficial" IRC channel to tor-friendly network:

migrate "unofficial" IRC channel to tor-friendly network

The Tor Project bug report:
move away from OFTC to new functional, Tor-friendly IRC network

move away from OFTC to new functional, Tor-friendly IRC network (#18002) ·...

Comments

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Patrick

2015-06-28 02:27:47 UTC

Ideally the new network would also offer an additional webchat (web gateway to it’s irc network) as OFTC offered.

This small list of Tor friendly IRC networks gets even smaller, because networks are listed there, which don’t provide a great service to Tor users. Namely freenode and OFTC.

Any recommendations which IRC network we should pick?

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HulaHoop

2015-06-28 23:37:44 UTC

DarkScience has a dedicated Onion Service.

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IronSoldier

2015-08-30 00:46:33 UTC

OFTC actually allows Tor connections via any IRC client. Actual limitation is that you can’t connect by the webchat.

So far there is not much IRC networks that allows Tor. Outside of OFTC, I also use Agora (Anarplex).

Agora offer a webchat (https://anarplex.net/webirc/) and allows connection from Tor (via clearnet address or .onion). As already discussed before, the downside of it is that users are forced to join #agora on connect… However this is not a major problem IMHO.

FROM https://anarplex.net/agorairc/connect.html:

Connect from the Clearnet
Connect directly (via Chatzilla, etc.): ircs://agora.anarplex.net:14716/#agora.

Host: agora.anarplex.net
Port: 14716

Connecting requires SSL, the certificate might be expired (which is not a problem unless you sell SSL certificates).
Connect to Tor hidden service
Connect directly (via Chatzilla, etc.): irc://cfyfz6afpgfeirst.onion:6667/#agora.

Host: cfyfz6afpgfeirst.onion
Port: 6667

Connection is already encrypted by Tor, so do NOT enable additional SSL for the connection.

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IronSoldier

2015-08-30 03:27:31 UTC

Other option would be to run our own IRC server with strict rules (Access to only Whonix channel, mandatory registration (match with forum registration database ?)

It would requests some server ressources and a bit of time but it can be done…

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Patrick

2015-08-30 10:04:34 UTC

Official #Tor is still on OTFC. Currently OTFC works for Tor users. Let’s see.

Next time it does not work, can you please bring this up on tor-talk about #Tor? @HulaHoop

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HulaHoop

2015-08-30 20:28:58 UTC

Hi IronSoldier! I haven’t seen you around for a while.

Did you put your Strategic Intelligence Network site online again?

I put up a guide on using syncthing with Onion services after you told me you were looking for easy ways to sync site mirrors:

https://www.whonix.org/w/index.php?title=Hidden_Services_Guides#Syncthing_with_OnionCat

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Before, OFTC blocked all Torrified IRC client connections from webchat and dedicated clients but recently they’ve permanently blocked anonymous webchat on their site and left IRC clients alone.

Good suggestions IronSoldier.

@Patrick I’ll post on Tor talk if it happens again.

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Patrick

2016-01-03 15:20:24 UTC

! In T361#6605, @Patrick wrote:
Official #Tor is still on OTFC. Currently OTFC works for Tor users. Let’s see.

Next time it does not work, can you please bring this up on tor-talk about #Tor? @HulaHoop

! In T361#6607, @HulaHoop wrote:
@Patrick I’ll post on Tor talk if it happens again.

If this is still an issue, now would be a good time.

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HulaHoop

2016-01-03 22:17:31 UTC

Done.

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Patrick

2016-01-04 12:03:55 UTC

• [tor-talk] OFTC semi-permanent Tor Blocking
• [tor-talk] OFTC and Tor

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Patrick

2016-01-05 13:36:20 UTC

! In T361#6604, @IronSoldier wrote:
Other option would be to run our own IRC server with strict rules (Access to only Whonix channel, mandatory registration (match with forum registration database ?)

It would requests some server ressources and a bit of time but it can be done…

I don’ think we want to host our own server. That’s problematic legal wise. (If users abuse using the private messaging function.) Better left to dedicated projects. The nice thing about public IRC is the synergy effects. People hanging out in multiple channels.

Agora offer a webchat (https://anarplex.net/webirc/) and allows connection from Tor (via clearnet address or .onion). As already discussed before, the downside of it is that users are forced to join #agora on connect…

Not great. But if Qubes, Torproject and Tails do not mind about this, I would not mind either.

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move away from OFTC to new functional, Tor-friendly IRC network:
move away from OFTC to new functional, Tor-friendly IRC network (#18002) · Issues · Legacy / Trac · GitLab

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IronSoldier

2016-01-25 20:29:00 UTC

Sorry for the delay… Even after having changed my email, Phabricator still sends email to my old one that I review about once a month…

Another option that I start to prefer over IRC is XMPP (aka jabber). We can run an XMPP Multi-User Chat (MUC) room.

Riseup.net is offering that : https://help.riseup.net/en/chat#connecting-to-multi-user-chatrooms

So whoever can join that chat room, registration can be done using about any providers (The ones I know that are privacy oriented : openxmpp.com, jabber.calyxinstitute.org, riseup.net)

SecureChat use jabber.calyxinstitute.org to create burner identity… I guess it can easily be done with a client like pidgin…

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HulaHoop

2016-01-27 03:25:01 UTC

If you go down the XMPP path please install anything but libpurple.

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IronSoldier

2016-01-27 13:18:31 UTC

I would recommend pidgin. It offer OTR (Off-The-Record) pluggin, is multi-protocol (XMPP, IRC, ICQ…) and Tails used a hardened version restricting protocol to IRC and XMPP only.

The regular version of pidgin is easy to install from debian repos (apt-get install pidgin pidgin-otr). It may need a bit of adaptation for xchat/mirc users but once you get it is not that much complicated.

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HulaHoop

2016-01-28 03:01:26 UTC

@IronSoldier my comment was vague and I don’t want to digress from the thread topic.

Its been mentioned in security circles that the XMPP library libpurple which Pidgin and other opensource IM programs are based is full of 0days - many remotely exploitable.

Our best bet is gajim or Adam Langley’s xmpp-client once a gui is written for it (written in type safe languages)

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mfc

2016-01-28 11:04:30 UTC

HulaHoop (HulaHoop):

HulaHoop added a comment.

@IronSoldier my comment was vague and I don’t want to digress from the thread topic.

Its been mentioned in security circles that the XMPP library libpurple which Pidgin and other opensource IM programs are based is full of 0days - many remotely exploitable.

Our best bet is gajim or Adam Langley’s xmpp-client once a gui is written for it (written in type safe languages)

TASK DETAIL
https://phabricator.whonix.org/T361

EMAIL PREFERENCES
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To: Patrick, HulaHoop
Cc: IronSoldier, bnvk, fortasse, JasonJAyalaP, crackman, Linostar, wax, joanna, MemoryLost, mfc, marmarek, nrgaway, Patrick, troubadour, HulaHoop, WhonixQubes

This is a discussion of servers not clients, please keep it on topic.

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Patrick

2016-02-02 17:41:40 UTC

I don’t think XMPP chats are practical for various reasons which I elaborated here:
migrate "unofficial" IRC channel to tor-friendly network · Issue #1571 · QubesOS/qubes-issues · GitHub

I would consider XMPP chat not a solution to this ticket but consider it a new feature. If you want to create such a XMPP chat room, please create a new ticket (if useful). Feel free to go for XMPP chat. Probably good idea. Let’s give it a test run. We could mention it on Free Support for Whonix and if it’s useful for some users why not.

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lynX

2016-05-12 10:02:20 UTC

I would not recommend using a public IRC network for the reasons discussed in (PSYC) IRC. The reasoning also applies to XMPP chatrooms as all of its traffic goes through federation, so XMPP is usually even worse.